A Budded Lotus
by Hymntanra
Summary: After an attack on the Dual Blade storage of ancient history tomes by a distressed apparition, a Dual Blader is left to talk with the spirit of a young twin who is somewhat lost.


A Budded Lotus

"So you were unable to capture the thief of the books."

The dark haired man stood in a highly decorated room with his head bowed respectfully. Scrolls decorated the wall, painted in vivid Japanese kanji. Lanterns hung down in the walkway that led up to the four stairs, adorned by red carpet. It led up to a small raised arena around which light colored cloth draped down around a wooden throne. Upon it sat a woman with dark brown hair covering her left amethyst eye; her body was covered by a skintight white dress that hugged at her hips and cut off only slightly below her panties. Thick white leather boots clung above her knees, folded patiently and decorated with red beads. A furred white jacket hung loosely from one shoulder and a fan tapped impatiently at the armrest of her chair.

"I am sorry, Lady Syl. The apparition managed to evade us, though the books were recovered and safely deposited where the Dual Blades could safely watch over them." The man standing below her responded in a clipped tone; he was just as displeased with himself as his mistress was. The brunette woman groaned irritably but nodded.

"At least there was some success in today's mission, then." She murmured. "In honor of my long past father, we must recover those history books and hide them in safely where only the right people can find them…people who intend to read them, not harm them. People who are not like this awful apparition who…who…"

"Lady Syl." The thief below warned her, gripping his weapon cautiously. His leader sighed and shook her head.

"Yes, yes. I know. I should be leaving that concern up to the warriors I send out to fight against this so called apparition. Have you gathered any information on it at all, Kim?" Lady Syl asked her servant. Slowly, with a bit of caution in his dark red eyes, the Dual Blader nodded. His leader's eyes lit up in interest. "Really? Where did you acquire it? What information is it? Tell me everything, immediately. I command you."

"The spirit is a creature that serves under the Blackwing association, going by the name of Suu." Lady Syl's servant said after a moment of silence. The brunette leader listened quietly, but she recognized the name of the organization that had been causing so much chaos in the past few years. "He is the twin brother of the Blackwings leader, Orca—I have been told this by the Alliance, who invited us to meet with them last week. Suu has a powerful ability to take possession of other's bodies, as you well know. He can take control of even the most prepared warrior and use their techniques as if it were his own. He can also take control of bodies and channel his own powers through the new vessel, if he so wishes."

"And the boy's own body?" Lady Syl questioned.

"According to contacts in Edelstein, the Blackwings leader recently ran into an incident that has left Suu's true body inaccessible to him. They refused to give up the full details at the conference but it seems like his body was in a coma at some point…and something recently happened that made it impossible to transfer his spirit back into the comatose form." Kim replied obediently. Lady Syl tapped her fan lightly against her lips, pondering this new information.

"…Thank you, Kim. You are dismissed. This information will hopefully provide useful in the Dual Blades' battle against this abhorrent apparition." The brunette woman said smoothly, flicking her fan outwards to direct her subject towards the door.

The man stared for a moment but did as he was told and retreated into the hallway to leave his mistress alone. Kim, like the other Dual Bladers, adhered to the exact words of Lady Syl. The only Dual Blader who did not do so was perhaps Ryden and nary a figher in the Secret Garden wanted to take the example of Ryden. After all, not only was Ryden not in the favor of many, he was also well known for having a reputation as a con man. Kim had better things to do than build himself up as a criminal; even though the Dual Bladers were commonly regarded as nothing more than thieves, those within the organization knew that they adhered to an honor system. Most of them anyways.

"How is the mistress?" Kim snapped his red eyed gaze around to look at a woman, about his height, balancing on the carved veranda. She wore black clothing; a sleeveless shirt that tucked into a brown belt and long pants that had large slits in the side. Gold buttons adorned the tops of the slits and atop her shirt was a patterned purple poncho. Her long black hair was slung into twin pigtails that were dyed a dark blue shade at the end. The tips of her bangs, hanging beside her ears, were dyed a similar shade.

"Daruwe." Kim nodded respectfully to his fellow fighter; though his younger cousin, she had proven herself in rank. The badge that was pinning her poncho together more than proved that. "The mistress is doing fine. She simple wanted more information on the apparition."

"Right…the information you got from the Alliance meeting, I assume?" His cousin asked pointedly as she twirled one of her twin blades on the tip of her fingers. The young girl never seemed to miss a beat.

"Yes. I told her everything that the Resistance would allow us to know. Unfortunately it wasn't as much as we would like, thanks to the spat that they're having with the Knights, but it is enough to satiate her for the time. She wishes to simply continue fighting the apparition." Kim replied. Daruwe tucked the knife in her belt and turned her blue eyed gaze to the side. "What? Is something wrong?"

"Some of the Dual Bladers are questioning this….apparition, you know."

"Questioning?"

"Yes. Questioning." Daruwe said sharply. Kim narrowed his eyes. "Don't you get it, Kim? People are questioning if we're wasting our time by pursuing a bunch of books—if we're involving ourselves in the worthless war of the outsiders by trying to save these books from the Blackwings apparition. That Lady Syl is leading us down a wrongful path in order to fulfill a vengeance that we should not be wasting our time on."

"…And what is your thought?"

"…My thought is not of matter here, Kim." Daruwe snapped forcefully. "I don't want to start a fight with you. I just needed to remind you that we are not an organization that has long been familiar with isolation from the problems of the outside world. We are not here to help them and hold their hands—nor are we here to seek vengeance for Lady Syl and her father."

"…Then, tell me, Daruwe." Kim asked stoically. "…What ARE we here for?"

His younger cousin opened her mouth to answer, but her words were interrupted by the sound of an explosion in the west hall. Both Dual Bladers looked over to the walkway from where the sound had come; heads began to poke out from the various sliding paper doors around them. Some of those inside the building came out of their rooms with weapons in hand. From behind them, the large wooden doors of Lady Syl's room slammed open to reveal their leader. Her amethyst eyes flashed with concern and rage.

"What in the world was that?!" She shouted.

Kim made to answer, but was interrupted by a smooth voice; he turned to see Ryden standing around the turn to the west hall. He was looking surprisingly calm for the direction he had come from. "Explosion in the west hall. Yun is acting strangely."

"Strangely?" Lady Syl questioned, eyes narrowing.

"She won't speak to anyone. She just keeps attacking everyone and advancing towards the lower floors of the west hall library." Ryden explained.

"The lower floors of the west hall library…." Lady Syl repeated. "Shit. That's where we keep the history books."

"A direct invasion?" Kim inquired.

"It's possible. Kim! Daruwe! Follow me!" The brunette woman ordered. The three Dual Bladers obliged and went after the woman.

Quickly, they emerged into the destroyed wooden hall. One of the bamboo doors was blown clean across the hallway and burn marks were engraved into the straw flooring. The paper sliding doors were torn in several places; upon closer inspection, Kim could easily tell that it had been done with a knife. His eyes travelled across the room to a darkened corner. Sitting there, amidst a pile of straw and wood, was the small figure of the redhead Dual Blader Yun. Something was off about her, though; a strange black and purple aura hovered around her being and her eyes flashed a dangerous light purple.

Kim recognized it immediately. He had seen it before.

"It is the apparition." He informed the other two fighters with him. Lady Syl nodded while Kim's cousin groaned in annoyance. "I've seen him before. This is the exact same aura that the other possessed people gave off."

"How did he get in here?" Daruwe asked.

"At the Alliance meeting….they mentioned that his body is no longer attainable. His presence might be lessened now that he doesn't have a physical attachment in this world. It weakens the will but empowers the rage." Kim replied. Daruwe rolled her eyes.

"Well, that's great." She snorted, flipping her blades out into view. Yun's eyes immediately focused in on the pigtailed girl. With a dash, almost too quick to see, the possessed redhead leapt forward and knocked the twin blades out of Daruwe's hands and across the room. The latter shrieked as her assailant clumsily took a katana off her own waistband, brandishing it with what Kim noticed was no clear skill—it certainly came nothing close to what Yun could truly execute. With trained ease the man thrust his foot upward and kicked the blade out the redhead woman's hand; the possessed eyes looked at the black haired thief in shock and then in rage.

"You seem to have lost your skill at possession. I was told you were better at utilizing the skills of the possessed…better than this, at least." Kim remarked, perhaps with a bit of chide in his tone. The possessed woman did nothing but growl; she reached for the other knife and threw it at the Dual Blader who had assaulted her. It missed by a mile and hit a lantern above Kim's head instead. The possessed Yun hissed in frustration and pounced upon her opponent, knocking him to him back as she clawed at his neck.

It was a short lasted victory. With a quick kick to the stomach, Kim had the woman on her back with her arms and legs hogtied behind her. Yun shrieked in dismay. Clearing sensing the inevitable defeat at its hands, a shock of purple and black energy seemed to dispel from the young redhead Dual Blader's body—with that, Yun's body went completely limp underneath Kim's powerful grip.

"Uhnnn…wha….Kim…?" She groaned lightly as one of her eyes opened slowly. The dark haired man released her, albeit slowly and cautiously. He watched the redhead carefully as she rose to her feet shakily and rubbed her wrists. "What in the heck happened? I feel like…I missed something…wow, what the heck happened here? It looked like a tornado hit or something."

As Yun began to talk with the other disciples and Lady Syl, who explained to her what exactly had happened to her and the room, Kim leaned against the wall. He was approached by his cousin. Her weight was shifted to one hip and she was eying him with a speculative look. "What?"

"Don't give me that crap, Kim." Daruwe shook her head, pigtails bouncing back and forth. "Something isn't right with you. You aren't happy."

"….It was too easy. The apparition…he was too clumsy. Like he didn't know what the hell he was doing." Kim mused. Daruwe glanced over to Yun, who was exchanging shocked glanced between the other Dual Bladers. "He could barely hold the katana, for heaven's sake. And yet I was told he was perfectly able to execute complex moves done by expert fighters while possessing them, moves that haven't been studied at all by anyone else. I can't imagine that YUN, a little girl like her, would be any more difficult to control than an expert fighter with a unique fighting style."

"So you're saying that he's up to something."

"Either that or something is wrong."

"…Huh." Daruwe sighed. "…Well, whatever. It's not my problem."

"It'll be ALL our problems if he finds those books that Lady Syl has been trying to find and protect." Kim reminded his cousin. She peeked over at their mistress for a moment, then shook her head.

"…You wanted my thoughts, Kim? Here are my thoughts." Daruwe said quietly. "I don't give a damn. If you and your boss want to start a little war with this apparition and get involved with something we shouldn't be involved in, be my guest. But I won't be one of the involved party. Have fun."

With that, his cousin walked away. Kim shook his head. Always the stubborn one, that girl. She believed in the traditional ways while he believed in Lady Syl's ways. After all, Lady Syl HAD been the one to take them in when they were nothing but worthless and penniless street thieves…and she had done them the favor of making them into bonafided warriors of honor, despite how worthless and penniless they had been. Kim had learned their honor and he abided by it.

_Maybe one day Daruwe will learn it too. And if not…well…_

Kim was interrupted by how crowded the room was getting, though. He was not a man that had ever been fond of large crowds and the one that the explosion had attracted was too much for his liking. With a groan, he decided it would be best to evade the loud hullabaloo by slipping into the adjacent library where the history books were stored—there was never a crowd in that room. Lady Syl would never allow loudness and crowds in such an important treasury. It was far too important a place and everyone knew it.

So, with all the silence that had been taught to him by years of practice, the Dual Blader slipped into the back room.

Thankfully it was much quieter in there, though he could still hear the occasional loud laughter of Ryden penetrating the wooden walls. Settling down on a dark red cushion with golden tassels, nearly buried under a pile of old scrolls covered in ancient kanji, Kim decided to crack open one of the history books that they had recovered. Lady Syl had, after all, encouraged the reading of these tomes in order to 'preserve the history that they were trying to save'. The Dual Blader himself didn't particularly understand all of it but the yarns that the books weaved were interesting enough.

"_So you prefer to read my prey?_"

Kim didn't move his head up from his book; he only moved his eyes slightly when he heard the quiet and lilting voice. It was high, almost feminine, but possessed an almost distinctly masculine quality to it. At the same time the tone was almost ethereal—like the dual wielding man was hearing a voice that was not actually even there. Without even turning, Kim knew exactly who he was being addressed by.

"_You're a pain. You've stopped quite a bit of my progress. I've had two major goals so far, really, and you've managed to impede one of them._" The voice continued, quiet and almost enticing. "_I'll give you credit. You're almost as troublesome as Phantom, even moreso—HE had to have his girlfriend get rid of me._"

"…You are weak at the moment, though." Kim finally said, closing his book curtly and turning around to face the spirit. He was surprised at what he saw. Of course, the boy had been described to him as non-threatening but the ghostly apparition in front of him was positively innocent in appearance. With a glowing white frame of ghostly plasma floating about him, it took nothing away from chubby cheeks and wide but calm eyes, covered by fine hair.

Suu, this deadly apparition, looked to be but a child.

Kim knew better than to judge by appearance, though.

"_…Yes. Unfortunately, I am weak at the moment. I have been cast out by Aria, and my body…has cast me out as well._" Suu said morosely. His tone seemed almost bitter and angry; the small fists that had early possessed Yun now were clenched into fists.

"What happened to that body, if I might ask?" Kim asked calmly.

"_...Tch. It is a fool's errand to think that I should tell you, and even more foolish of me to think of revealing the truth to you. But what do I even have to lose anymore?_" Suu snorted slightly, crouching down a small distance from the other. His shorts rode slightly up his chubby thighs and small translucent hands went to pull them back over pale skin. "_I have lost my body. It has been sacrificed, for the sake of SCIENCE, in order for that fool Gelimer to further his experiments. He used his body to hurt my sister. All of those BLACKWINGS that she hired are nothing but idiots. That fool Gelimer thinks that my body will be of some use in resurrecting the Black Mage…the reality is, that time is already close at hand with the foolhardiness of exploring idiots going around the Temple of Time. Tch. And now, thanks to him, my dear sister…she has abandoned the Blackwings AND I will never retrieve my body!_"

"Did the Blackwings and Black Mage always do you this ill?" Kim inquired. Suu shrugged absentmindedly, picking at one of the wrapped scrolls in front of him. Briefly the Dual Blader wonder if he should even allow the apparition in this room—but Suu didn't seem too dangerous at the moment. He seemed almost defeated.

"_No. At one point, we all worked together. The generals were divided, of course, but we stayed quiet under the rule of the Black Mage. No one defied him. But…we all treated each other poorly outside of his eye. He was the only one who was kind to me and my sister._" Suu frowned visibly. "_I would do anything for my master. Anything for the Black Mage, and anything for my sister. And these Blackwings fools that divide the generals, these Blackwings fools that now put her on the side of the Resistance that allies with the Empress…they now separate me and my sister._"

"Only if you let them."

"_What?_"

"If you would do anything for your sister, would you switch sides for her? If you got your body back, would you pick your sister Orca or a newly resurrected Black Mage?" Kim asked seriously. Suu studied the crimson eyes carefully. "I understand your dilemma, boy. I care deeply for my leader, Lady Syl, but equally for my last relative. My cousin Daruwe. We hold different beliefs on Lady Syl's choices towards your actions."

"_One day Orca will see it my way._"

"If she doesn't?" Kim asked. "I know that if Daruwe does not see it my way….well…blood runs thicker than water. I would pick my blood over Lady Syl every time, no matter how much I treasure her leadership."

_"…I need not your guidance, freak._" Suu replied, but the tone was not harsh. Rather, it was contemplative. "_But…I would more be likely to pick my sister. For she is my twin, and the one who has been there with me forever. I don't like having to pick the other side but…"_

"Sometimes you have to make a choice you don't want to."

"_…I will leave you and you strange group, for now._" Suu stood to his feet, dusting off his coat. Kim couldn't imagine why he would do that; he figured that dust couldn't cling to a ghost suit anyhow. The boy snorted and his feet began to wisp away. "_…I have matters to attend to. Do not think this settles the feud between this servant of the Black Mage and the Dual Blades. I may have future business with you yet, wielder of twin blades._"

"We'll see." Kim said quietly, flipping through another history book as the apparition disappeared peacefully for once. "We will see."

End~


End file.
